It was because in order to receive his
protection that I should have to bow before such a fellow, that I
resolved that I would live by myself even if I had to do milk delivery.
Shortly afterwards he sent for a second-hand dealer and sold for a song
all the bric-a-bric which had been handed down from ages ago in our
family. Our house and lot were sold, through the efforts of a middleman
to a wealthy person. This transaction seemed to have netted a goodly sum
to him, but I know nothing as to the detail.
For one month previous to this, I had been rooming in a boarding house
in Kanda-ku, pending a decision as to my future course. Kiyo was greatly
grieved to see the house in which she had lived so many years change
ownership, but she was helpless in the matter.
"If you were a little older, you might have inherited this house," she
once remarked in earnest.
If I could have inherited the house through being a little older, I
ought to have been able to inherit the house right then. She knew
nothing, and believed the lack of age only prevented my coming into the
possession of the house.
Thus I parted from my brother, but the disposal of Kiyo was a difficult
proposition. My brother was, of course, unable to take her along, nor
was there any danger of her following him so far away as Kyushu, while I
was in a small room of a boarding house, and might have to clear out
anytime at that.
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